On Super Bowl Sunday next week, some of our larger and faster union brothers—members of the NFL Players Association (NFLPA)—will be battling it out in Glendale, Ariz., at Super Bowl XLIX (49 for those of us who are shaky on Roman numerals). While the Super Bowl carries a union label, from players to broadcast crews to stadium workers—your Super Bowl party spread can, too, with union-made in America food and drinks.

Two union members, one representing the benefits of union training and apprenticeship programs and the other the resurgence of the U.S. auto industry were guests of first lady Michelle Obama during last night’s State of the Union address.

Laborers (LIUNA) Local 300 member LeDaya Epps said:

The skills training I received through my union has done more than teach me a trade. It’s renewed my life. It has been a lifeline to a career I am proud of and allowed me to provide for myself and my three children.

Epps was unemployed a year ago, but with the help of the Los Angeles Black Worker Center, an affiliate of the UCLA Labor Center, enrolled in an apprenticeship-readiness program sponsored by the Los Angeles/Orange Counties Building Trades Council. After completing that training, she entered Local 300’s apprenticeship program.

The Compton, Calif., native is currently working on a project to expand the light rail train line for the LA Metro to Los Angeles International Airport.

During his address, President Barack Obama spoke forcefully about how job training and paid apprenticeships, such as the one that has opened doors for Epps, are “opportunities that give workers the chance to earn higher-paying jobs even if they don’t have a higher education.”

He also called for laws that “that strengthen rather than weaken unions, and give American workers a voice [and]…that make sure a woman is paid the same as a man for doing the same work.”

Also sitting with Mrs. Obama was Tiairris Woodward of UAW Local 7 in Detroit. She works at Chrysler’s Jefferson North Assembly Plant. Chrysler has emerged from its 2009 bankruptcy and now, like the entire American automobile industry, is making big contributions to the nation’s economy.

Woodward, a 43-year-old mom from Harrison, Mich., took on a second full-time job at Chrysler in 2010 after she found that she couldn’t support herself and her three children. After working 17-hour days across two jobs for some time, Tiairris was able to move solely to her Chrysler assembly line position. Within a year, she’d saved enough to buy a car and rent a new apartment and is attending college.

Some 18,000 California registered nurses, members of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United (CNA/NNU), who work at 86 Kaiser Permanente hospitals and clinics are voting this week on a new contract. The agreement, reached after months of negotiations, will give the RNs a stronger voice on patient care and provides breakthrough improvements in workplace protections.

The union also called off a scheduled two-day strike this week against Kaiser Permanente.

CNA/NNU Executive Director RoseAnn DeMoro praised “the unity of Kaiser RNs and their devotion to assuring the highest level of quality care for patients as well as protections for the nurses who deliver that care.”

The unions said a key to the settlement was the agreement by Kaiser to establish a new committee of direct care RNs and nurse practitioners who will work with management to address the concerns RNs have about care standards in Kaiser facilities. Zenei Cortez, RN, co-president of the CNA, said:

We have an agreement that will strengthen the ability of Kaiser RNs to provide the optimal level of care our patients deserve, while establishing additional security for nurses.

In addition to the new patient care and workplace protection improvements, Kaiser has committed to hiring hundreds of new RNs and to providing training and employment opportunities for new RN graduates. The agreement also provides significant economic gains and additional retirement security.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said, “President Obama eloquently and forcefully advocated for working families throughout his State of the Union Address,” last night. He also said:

The president’s focus on raising wages through collective bargaining, better paying jobs, a fairer tax code, fair overtime rules, and expanded access to education and earned leave sent the right message at the right time.

Read the rest of the statement below:

So did his embrace of union apprentices and immigrants who want to achieve the American Dream. The president has again demonstrated his strong commitment to creating an economy that truly works for all working people.

Fighting income inequality is one of the biggest challenges of our time. As Oxfam recently reminded us, the world’s wealth continues to be increasingly concentrated in the hands of a very few. If we are serious about solving this monumental challenge, the size of the solutions must meet the scale of the problem. We must have a similarly vigorous response to the barriers to raising wages: our opposition to fast-tracked trade deals that are giant giveaways to big corporations must be resolute. We can’t face the competitive challenge of China with a trade deal that fails to adequately address currency manipulation, climate change or that gives corporations rights that people don’t have.

Now is the time for politicians to champion a Raising Wages agenda that ties all the pieces of economic and social justice together. America has now heard what the president thinks about this agenda. We thank the president for his passion and his advocacy. We are ready to see what he and Congress will do about it. That is the ultimate standard of accountability.

After a 13-day strike, followed by two meetings with a federal mediator, trash haulers employed by Unity Disposal in Montgomery and Howard counties in Maryland have ratified a new four-year collective bargaining agreement.

The new contract provides immediate pay raises for all Unity drivers and helpers, increases overall paid time off, ensures employees who work extra routes will now get paid more for that extra work, and provides a grievance procedure that puts into writing a fair disciplinary policy. Unity helper Francisco Fuentes said:

We stood up and we insisted that we all be treated with respect and paid fairly. We stuck together, we kept our eyes on the finish line, and we now have a new contract that recognizes the value of the work we do, and allows us to better support our families.

Unity Disposal contracts with Montgomery and Howard counties to provide trash pick-up service to more than 60,000 households.

There is a loophole in the rules that govern Wall Street brokers and financial firms that provide retirement investment advice that can drain away thousands, or even tens of thousands, of dollars of hard-earned savings from a single retirement account. Today, a coalition of senior, union and consumer groups launched a new website—SaveOurRetirement.org—to mobilize support to close the “Retirement Advice Loophole” through a new rule the U.S. Department of Labor is trying to adopt.

The way workers save for retirement has changed dramatically over the past decades. With the decline in traditional pensions, more and more workers depend on 401(k) plans and individual retirement accounts (IRAs), and they frequently seek investment advice from financial professionals. But the rule governing when that advice must be solely in the worker’s interest, free from conflicts of interest, has not been changed since 1975—and many loopholes exist.

The “Retirement Advice Loophole“ allows Wall Street brokers and financial firms with major conflicts of interest to provide investment advice that serves their own interests instead of what’s best for their clients.

For example, they can sell financial products that pay large commissions but hurt their clients with unnecessary fees, poor returns or excessive risks. Millions of Americans are affected by this loophole every year without even knowing it, and it is draining away their retirement savings.

Right now, some advisers are required to put their customers’ interests first while others are not—and it is often extremely difficult for workers and retirees to know which type of adviser they are dealing with.

The Labor Department rule has been under development for some time but has not been released yet. However, it is expected to require that investment advisers have no conflict of interest that might, for example, cause them to steer their clients toward investments that earn the adviser high fees but might not be in the client’s best interest. The rule should require anyone who gives retirement investment advice to act solely in their client’s best interest—a common sense standard known as the fiduciary duty.

Nearly 12,000 Delta Air Lines flight attendants have signed authorization cards seeking union representation by the Machinists (IAM). More than two dozen Delta flight attendants hand-delivered those cards Tuesday to the National Mediation Board’s (NMB’s) headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Once the NMB validates those signatures—expected in about four to six weeks—the agency will set an election date for the airline’s 20,000 flight attendants.

Delta Air Lines flight attendant Gabe Perez, who has been with the airline for 35 years, said:

We are the reason Delta is the world’s most profitable carrier and leads the industry in almost every financial and operational measure. Yet, we lag the industry in wages, benefits and work rules. That will change once we win our election and negotiate the industry-best contract we deserve.

IAM President R. Thomas Buffenbarger, who accompanied the flight attendants to the NMB, called it “an historic day for these courageous flight attendants.”

IAM General Vice President Sito Pantoja called the flight attendants:

an inspiration to the entire labor movement. The IAM will make every effort to ensure that they achieve their goal of negotiating an industry-leading contract.

The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA-CWA) supports the Delta flight attendants campaign to win a voice with the IAM and says a victory would lift standards for all flight attendants. AFA-CWA and Delta flight attendants were unsuccessful in a previous election that was held under different NMB rules.

We told you how Republican House members last week went after Social Security on their very first day at work. Some 11 million people who receive Social Security disability benefits could see their benefits cut by 20% in 2016 and cuts to Social Security retirement benefits for everyone could also be in store. Here’s what some other folks have to say about that and other attacks Republicans may launch against Social Security.

The coalition Social Security Works says last week’s action barring transfer of funds from the Social Security Retirement Trust Funds to the Social Security disability program—known as reallocation—unless taxes are raised or benefits are cut is “stealth attack on America’s working families.”

Like other stealth attacks against the American people’s Social Security, the groundwork is being laid in advance. It will suddenly explode sometime in the next two years. The rule change would prohibit a simple reallocation! It will require more significant and complex changes to Social Security. In other words, the Republican rule will allow Social Security to be held hostage….Hostage-taking to force changes that the American people do not want to a vital program like Social Security is no way to run the United States of America.

By barring the House from approving a “clean” reallocation in 2016, the rule will strengthen the hand of lawmakers who seek to attach harsh conditions (such as sharp cuts in eligibility or benefit amounts) to such a measure.

It is hard to believe that there is any purpose to this unprecedented change to House rules, other than to cut benefits for Americans who have worked hard all their lives, paid into Social Security and rely on their Social Security benefits, including Disability Insurance, in order to survive.

Richard Eskow of the Campaign for America’s Future asks on Huffington Post, “Why are they doing this?”

Undoubtedly, one reason is to please campaign contributors. Wealthy individuals, like conservative billionaire hedge-funder Pete Peterson, are committed to gutting the program. Many defense contractors and Wall Street firms are involved in the campaign to cut Social Security through a group called ‘Fix the Debt,’ despite the fact that Social Security doesn’t contribute to the federal debt. (Ironically, all of these firms have benefited greatly from public expenditures.) What’s their motivation? Among other things, Social Security cuts would ensure that they’re not asked to pay more in taxes.

And then there’s this scary reminder from Eric Laursen at AlterNet, “Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is now chair of the House Ways and Means Committee.”

This makes him an even bigger force on Social Security policy than he was as Budget Committee chair, when he repeatedly called for hobbling the program….With Ryan heading up their response, the Republicans are more likely to insist on drastic changes to the entire program.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) unveiled a new plan today to address the large and growing problem of income inequality that he says, “attacks the chronic problem of stagnant middle-class incomes from both directions: it promotes bigger paychecks and lets workers keep more of what they earn.”

His plan would create or expand tax breaks for child care, apprenticeship programs, middle-class working couples, those who save for retirement and companies that raise workers’ wages, while at the same time scaling back the tax break corporations currently claim for CEO bonuses. Van Hollen said his proposals are fully paid for with a “high-rollers fee” on Wall Street.

We can pay for these new tax benefits for working Americans by changing the ways our current tax code is rigged in favor of those who make money off of money and against those who make money from work.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka praised Van Hollen for “showing the kind of leadership that has become far too rare in Washington, D.C., today. Many of the policy prescriptions he outlined today are part of the blueprint to seriously addressing income inequality.” He also said:

A modest Wall Street speculation tax, or ‘high-roller fee’ as Rep. Van Hollen has proposed, will help curb harmful Wall Street practices and raise billions of dollars annually. These are critical funds that could pay for infrastructure and education to lay the foundation for long-term productivity growth. Additionally, Rep. Van Hollen is absolutely right to deny tax breaks for ridiculous, out of control CEO pay—they don’t need any more handouts.

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would have been prevented from issuing timely guidelines on protecting health care workers and first responders from the Ebola virus and how to control the spread of the deadly virus to the public under a Republican bill the House is set to vote on this week.

The bill (H.R.185) would add dozens of new procedural and analytical roadblocks to any new enforceable rule such as workplace safety or consumer protection regulations and even to non-binding federal guidelines to protect workers and the public, such as the CDC’s Ebola guidelines issued last fall.

In a letter to the House, AFL-CIO Government Affairs Director Bill Samuel wrote that the Regulatory Accountability Act (RAA) “will not improve the regulatory process: it will cripple it,” and will add years to the process.

The development of major workplace safety rules already takes six to 10 years, even for rules where there is broad agreement between employers and unions on the measures that are needed to improve protections. The RAA will further delay these rules and cost workers their lives.

Under current law such as the Occupational Safety and Health Act and the Mine Safety and Health Act, agencies must adopt the rule that would be the most protective for workers. But under the Republican bill, federal agencies must adopt the least costly rule. Said Samuel:

It would make protecting workers and the public secondary to limiting costs and impacts on businesses and corporations.

Not only does the bill apply to any regulations from all federal agencies such as Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), but also from independent agencies such as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the National Labor Relations Board, the Consumer Product Safety Commission and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Along with the regulations, the RAA adds new hoops agencies must jump through before issuing major guidance documents such as the CDC’s Ebola guidelines.

The bill is a top priority for business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and others, which plan to mount major lobbying campaigns for the legislation. A companion Senate bill is expected to be introduced soon. When similar legislation passed the House in the 112th Congress, the Obama administration said it would veto the bill. It has yet to issue a veto threat for H.R. 185.

Last year, AFL-CIO Safety and Health Director Peg Seminario told a U.S. Senate committee that the years-long delays and burdensome requirements “[are] failing to protect workers and costing workers’ lives.” New roadblocks, such as the ones in H.R. 185, would, she said:

bring standard setting for worker safety to a grinding halt and make it impossible for OSHA to issue needed worker safety and health protections.